Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine was at Rebecca Towers last 
week, courting the elderly Hispanic voters that helped propel him to victory two years ago. He also took his whole slate of candidates — Ricky Arriola, John Elizabeth Aleman and Betsy Perez — who he wants elected so they can rubber stamp his decisions.
But what he didn’t tell the group of viejitos assembled is that his campaign manager and political consultant, David Custin — who is also the campaign consultant for his three commission candidates — has big plans for their home. Custin is getting paid $10,000 a month to turn the low-income senior subsidized housing community into a luxury marina with condos and maybe a hotel or a nightclub or something.
That’s $10,000 a month since February.
Custin — who is suddenly raking it in on the Beach (more on that later) — is the registered lobbyist for TC Miami Beach Marina, LLC, for the “redevelopment of property and city approval for Miami Beach Marina and Rebecca Towers,” according to forms he filled out with the city.
But, um, wait a minute. Is Rebecca Towers up for grabs? Apparently so. Nevermind that people live there. They will soon move due to increasing rents that many cannot afford while public officials say that the beach has a surplus of public housing and doesn’t need so much.
Is it a coincidence that the rents are going up right when the mayor’s boy wants to force the residents out? Ah, Ladra thinks not.
Rebecca Towers is two buildings with 400 units for Section 8 residents. At capacity, the towers house nearly 500 people. It was built in 1975 (South) and 1979 (North) and is operated with federal housing dollars.
But it is a unique public housing complex in that it is waterfront, at 150 and 200 Alton Road, on a sliver of 
South Beach that has really blossomed over the past decade. The property is likely worth somewhere around $75 million, maybe even $100 million. Maybe more. And there could be an argument for selling the land or entering into a public private partnership to redevelop it and build housing elsewhere.
But there is already a quiet, nervous murmuring among the residents at Rebecca Towers about how long they’ll be able to stay there and whether or not they’re going to be pushed out. Commissioner Deede Weithorn is concerned enough to be meeting this week with Miami-Dade Commission Bruno Barreiro about it.
“I’m worried about the seniors being displaced,” Weithorn told Ladra. “Even if we did build something wonderful and amazing for them, where are they going to go in the meantime? These are elderly people who are not easily transportable. Even if it’s better in the long run, I wonder what their day-to-day lives are going to be like.”
For Ladra, it seems rather sneaky that the mayor says nothing about these grand plans while he performs for these people’s votes all while his political handler profits off this developing inside, unsolicited deal.
Also, sources tell me that this all comes
after Levine pressured the ousting of several directors of the Miami Beach Development Corporation, beginning a month after the mayor was first elected after an alleged city review found supposed “fiscal and operational discrepancies” — including $300,000 in double billing related to a different affordable housing development. I use “alleged” and “supposed” because there haven’t been any arrests or indictments in almost two years.
The mayor solely appoints the board now, like he does with all committees, Ladra is told, and he’s stacked this one with cronies. The MBDC is a quasi public agency that makes the decisions for public housing on the beach — what to build, where to build it, what rents to charge.
Some fear that the raising rents are a coordinated effort to push the low-income viejitos out of not just Rebecca Towers but all of Miami Beach, so that there is no “unmet need” for housing and, in fact, a surplus. Hmmm… wanna bet on which housing complex goes down first?
The word about the big plans for Rebecca Towers got out last week and already Steve Cody has made another video of it — this time, adding one in Spanish for the benefit of most of the people who live in Rebecca Towers. “Phil Levine wants to give Rebecca Towers to the rich,” is the title of the video, which urges people not to vote for the three candidates on the slate.
“Vote like your whole world depends on it,” the video ends. Because for many people, it does.
Phil Levine’s consultant pushes marina at Rebecca Towers added by Ladra on
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[…] and city approvals for Miami Beach Marina and Rebecca Towers.” Or he was. Because after Political Cortadito’s first story came out on the planned Rebecca Towers redevelopment and Custin’s ties to it, the item was removed from his list of clients on the city’s […]
If you look at the Miami Beach City Clerk’s list of lobbyists now, under the name of David Custin, the Marina/Rebecca Towers project is no longer listed. It was there early this morning (Saturday, October 3rd) and gone this afternoon. Just letting you all know…
[…] Read related story: Phil Levine’s consultant pushes marina at Rebecca Towers […]
I do not reply in response to these indiscriminate bitter personal attacks on so many good people, in an effort to prove that you are the only sane person here on Miami Beach, because they should rightly be ignored.
Your unremitting nastiness closes down the discourse as it repels everybody
I feel compelled to write to correct your historical facts.
In the 12th century, big ,bad ,bold men unscrupulously
amassed personal fortunes,by using illegal and immoral business practices and became known as Robber Barons and formed a powerful
court round a King.
And heck ,there is even an EARL in all this .
Geddit?
Lighten up .
Solve the fascinating history/mystery of the John .
Levine Robber Baron doesn’t need to give me reading lessons n ignorant like most low rent Beach activists missed the point. Levine does NOT fit the definition of robber baron as they were all industrialists involved with Trusts broken up by President Theodore Roosevelt before World War I. Delvecchio Mike Burke Jo Manning the same people who moved Heaven n earth to dump the Hispanic leadership on the Beach like Matti Bower Jorge Gonzalez Roberta Datorre with lies in favour of Scott Robins stooges lead by Philip Levine and Jonah Wolfson now cry WOLF! because he treats them like they don’t matter! And Frank Delvecchio is NOT a lawyer. ! just for the record. He has a law degree but never was admitted to the Bar. He was a non lawyer HUD bureaucrat.
Please do not use my name in your diatribes. I do not know you, nor do I care to know you. Thank you.
Dave,
Clearly her parents were Johnny Cash fans. The King picked her because she could deliver the PTA moms. Phil has never supported the kids in Miami Beach. Girl named John pretends to not have known Phil or Custin before.
Who is this Aleman chic?; and why did the political mafia pick her? She has ZERO experience. In all my years leading the Leadership Academy and running for office, I did not hear her name or see her face even once.
Ms Aleman is part of the Phil Levine slate, from what I have observed and read. I cannot, in all good conscience vote for anyone on that slate. What others do is up to them, but, “fool me once, shame on you”…”fool me twice, shame on me.” I cannot allow myself to be fooled again.
Dear Miss Kulick
The real estate developers are NOT and haven’t ever been nobles or FFVs or in the 400 and except for three princes four counts and NO BARONs or baronets no titled nobility has had a real estate investment on Miami Beach. The Robins family formerly Rabinowitz are many things but no one ever called them noble
Go back and re-read what Jean wrote. She wasn’t calling out Levine’s co-opting the word “BARON” because of its nobility association, but rather because it is one half of “ROBBER BARON,” which aptly describes this reckless man.
OK I’ll say it: all the seniors retirees and low wage and rental tenants who stabbed Matti Bower; Jorge Esposito; Michael Gongora; jerry libbing and both Jorge Gonzalez n Roberto Dattore in the back because of Phil Levine’s free bees n Jonah Wolf sons snake oil r discovering too late they made a deal with the development devils that will destroy them lead by Lucifer Scott robins
Oops a mistake, wrong condo !
Mayor went to Continuum, but its the same thing,
What a despicable and callous scheme. Jettison the old and vulnerable to benefit another greedy developer and create a rich man’s enclave.
This is the vision of our unscrupulous mayor.
He left the 5 o’clock City Commission Budget meeting after an hour and a half to rush to his FriendRaiser at Apogee,down the street from Rebecca Towers
Winning his election is more important than dealing with water and sewage rate hikes for residents,.He’s not much good at discussing the budget anyway,so he wasn’t missed, but he sure is good at just getting deals done with his fellow robber barons
Sort of a funny freudian slip I thought,to name all his companies BARON this and BARON that.
Vote for an honest man. Vote for David Wieder.
Matti: The video is available in Spanish. Here’s the link.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nfns5DzF_GY
You seem to be confusing two different agencies: Miami Beach Housing Authority and Miami Beach Community Development Corporation.
call HUD. MBCDC is not a housing authority
LAURA do you have this article in Spanish ? I would love to take it to Rebecca towers
Matti,
Si Ladra no lo tiene yo te lo traduzco… Pero hay que llegar a estos ancianos cuanto antes… Es una vergüenza lo que esta haciendo este Payaso y sus monigotes!!!
Madame Mayor, I will translate it to Spanish and someone ought to print it out and include a print out of a photo of David Custin’s registration with the city, which shows he is getting paid $10,000 a month for a marina at Rebecca Towers.
I understand that Levine and his slate mates have been defending themselves and saying that this blog post is false. But Custin ain’t getting $10K a month to paint the hallways there. Let people make up their own mind once they see the actual documents.
Give me a day or two. Absentee ballots don’t go out for another couple of weeks so there is a little time.
Love, Ladra
Unconscionable, isn’t it? And the Slate candidates are already condemning it as a lie.
Yeah, let the old folks eat cake…stuff their mouths with it, shake your booty with a little salsa, and get them to vote for you. For shame!
They are so vulnerable, and the people doing this…candidates and their toadies both…what kind of human beings are they?
Fact is that forcing the elderly to move usually condemns them to an early grave. Have seen this happen many times.
Bless folks like Elaine de Valle and Steve Cody and Bill Cooke for having the guts to expose all of this!